


Five Things That Never Happened to Sirius Black

by misura



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Canon, Community: fic_on_demand, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-09
Updated: 2008-03-09
Packaged: 2017-10-23 14:03:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/251112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[a sequel to Juxian Tang's <i>I Don't Remember</i> (link included)]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things That Never Happened to Sirius Black

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [I Don't Remember](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/4457) by Juxian Tang. 



> written 'on demand', this is a sequel to Juxian Tang's _I Don't Remember_
> 
> What Happened in There: After having been found out as a spy for the Order, Snape somehow finds his way back to Hogwarts - severely damaged and with a serious case of memory-loss. Sirius, feeling guilty over having tormented Snape when they were both students, volunteers to take care of him, and eventually, the two of them fall in love. (It is revealed that Sirius used to have a crush on James.) Then the pensieve holding Snape's memories is found, and Sirius realizes that whatever he had with Snape is going to end the moment Snape gets those memories back.  
> Notes: Sirius has come back from beyond the Veil - leading Snape to comment that 'even Death didn't want him'. Albus Dumbledore is alive, and Remus Lupin is happily shacked up with Tonks.

[1]

Sirius was on his sixth or seventh bottle when Snape arrived. At first, Sirius wasn't sure if it was really Snape or just an alcohol-induced hallucination, but once Snape opened his mouth, Sirius knew he was real.

Snape said: "I am not surprised to find you in a place like this."

Sirius thought about that for a moment, then came back with: "I _am_ surprised to find _you_ in a place like this."

"I came here to look for you," explained Snape, his tone hinting that only someone particularly dim-witted would have needed to be informed of that.

"I came here because I was sure you wouldn't find me here."

"You're drunk."

"You're sober," offered Sirius.

"I remember everything."

"I'm forgetting everything." Since Snape looked slightly alarmed at that, Sirius added: "For tonight, anyway. Tomorrow morning, I'll have a horrible hang-over."

"Why?"

"Because that's what happens when you get drunk."

"No," said Snape, "why did you ... do what you did?"

"I don't remember."

"Black, you're a horrible liar."

"Are you going to kill me?"

"And save you the hang-over? Perish the thought."

"Why are you here, then?"

Snape looked pensive for a moment, then said: "There's a fairly easy to make potion that counters the effects of a hang-over. I'll brew some of it for you."

 

[2]

"A potion?" asked Snape, wandering over to the cauldron and cautiously smelling its cooling contents. Then, he picked up the note again.

_I suppose you're going to think it rather funny I used a potion for this._

"Oh, indeed, Black. This is me, being highly amused by your fooling around with potions."

_Albus has told me you'll remember everything, so I'm going to assume you're not very happy with me right now._

"An understatement."

_I won't ask you to forgive me. I'm not sorry for what I did._

"Are you ever?" Snape frowned. Given the amount of spillage, and the present ingredients, Sirius had made rather a large batch - larger than any one person might need, unless he was a completely inept idiot. Snape sighed. That about sounded like Sirius.

 _I mean: I'm not sorry for what I - or no, for what_ we _did these past months. It was something great and good and I wish it could have lasted longer. I_ am _sorry for some of that other stuff._

"Only some of it. I see."

_Goodbye and good luck._

"Dramatic and incosiderate right to the end." Snape considered for a moment, then crumpled the note and left the room in search of Dumbledore. He didn't have to search very long, and he wasn't wholly surprised to see the person standing next to Dumbledore with an empty expression on his face.

"I'll take care of him," snapped Snape. Dumbledore looked tired and worried, as if one more burden might break his back. Snape silently cursed the person responsible for adding the most recent weight. "The idiot used a potion."

Dumbledore nodded sadly.

_Please don't try to bring me back. I know what I'm doing, and it's the right thing. If my only choice is to lose you or to forget you, I'd rather not remember you at all._

 

[3]

Sirius had been tempted to lock himself into his room, after Dumbledore had made it very clear to him that if he chose to leave now, he would feel obliged to have him dragged back to Hogwarts. He'd decided against it in the end, haunted by visions of Snape blowing up his door and looming in the smoke like a vengeful wraith.

They were both grown-ups, he'd told himself. They weren't students anymore, blind and oblivious to the hurt their words and actions could cause others. They'd both changed - Sirius because of Azkaban and the Veil, and Snape ... well, maybe Snape hadn't really changed much, after all.

"Albus has informed me I ought to thank you for having taken care of me these past months," said Snape now, sitting down without waiting for Sirius to offer him a chair.

"Yes, well, I wouldn't want you to choke or anything," said Sirius.

"Thank you."

Sirius waited for the next bit, the sarcastic addition, the acid observation that Sirius had, perhaps, gone a bit too far in 'taking care' of Snape. He'd been expecting accusations - angry ones, with Snape sneering at him and telling him how low he'd sunken, how much Snape despised him. It didn't come.

"That's it?" he asked.

"You were hoping for something more?" Snape inquired, one eyebrow raised. "We may not be the best of friends; nonetheless, you have given me aid when I was injured and helpless. I'm grateful. I have little doubt I was expected to die, slowly, distracting Albus from his duties as the head of the Order."

"Anything for the cause, eh?" said Sirius, wondering if Snape even realized that he was making it sound as if he didn't consider his life particularly valuable; he was grateful for Sirius having spared Albus the 'distraction' of having a dying, memory-less Snape on his hands, not for anything else.

"You used to have a crush on Potter, didn't you?"

Sirius blinked, more surprised at the sudden change in subject than in Snape having noticed something. He'd thought it had been obvious, really, even though he'd done his best not to let it show. He'd always been afraid of what might happen one day, if Remus or Peter found out, or worse yet, James. When Lily had entered the picture, he'd been torn between relief and jealousy - relief, because the question of whether or not he might one day come out to James had been settled once and for all, and jealousy because James was obviously in love with Lily (and, by extension, not with Sirius).

"It's a long time ago." Sirius realized he could have denied it, and Snape would likely have dropped the matter. After all, what proof could Snape possibly have? For that matter, what interest could Snape have in who Sirius had had a crush on? James was dead.

Snape seemed to hesitate for a moment, then said, almost too low for Sirius to hear him: "You weren't the only one with a rather hopeless crush." Which could mean anything, really, Sirius told himself. "Of course, that was before I actually got to know the person in question. Youth makes us all shallow, I suppose. Fortunately, I realized my mistake fairly quickly."

"You didn't ... " If he'd known, Sirius was all too aware that he'd have been disgusted. He'd have set out to make Snape's life a living hell.

"Albus thinks your main-motivation was guilt, by the way," Snape went on. "He made it quite clear I should make it known to you I had completely forgiven you for any and all past sins you might have committed against me in the past."

"Have you?" Sirius' mouth was dry. If Snape had noticed his crush on James, did that mean he'd noticed the way Sirius had been avoiding him lately, too? Was Snape here to tell him that he had neither forgotten nor forgiven the past, and intended to make Sirius pay for it?

Snape rose and left without answering.

 

[4]

Sirius had been careful to conceal his tracks. He'd been a hunted man for a long time - for the better part of his life, he sometimes felt - and as a result, he'd picked up a considerable number of tricks and useful skills.

That night when he'd left Hogwarts, because Snape would be sure to try and kill him if he'd stayed, and, true, also because Sirius didn't really want to let go of those memories of how Snape had been without his memories to hold him back, to make him view Sirius as an enemy, someone to scorn, instead of someone to trust and love - that night, he'd used everything he knew to make sure nobody would be able to find him, not even Dumbledore or Remus. Especially not Dumbledore or Remus.

"I believe it's traditional for me to make a comment along the lines of how you're a hard man to find," said Snape, struggling for a few moments with the mechanism of his umbrella, then giving up and putting the thing on the floor as it was, instead of in the umbrella-stand. "However, honesty compells me to say that for a wanted man, you show a remarkable lack of either discretion or caution, not to mention an appalling taste in hotels."

"At least the roof doesn't leak," said Sirius automatically. It was the landlady's standard-reply to every customer's complaint, and as far as Sirius had been able to ascertain, completely true.

Snape gave him a look. Sirius thought a lot of students had probably been on the receiving end of one of those looks, or several of them.

"Do the words: 'Black, you bastard, there you are. Dumbledore is killing himself over you,' ring a bell?"

Sirius estimated how long it'd take him to race to his room, grab his wand and - no, that probably wasn't going to work. Besides, Snape had found him once already; doubtlessly, he'd be able to do so again.

"I - " he began.

"You're a twat," Snape told him flatly. "A complete moron. An utter idiot. A fool."

"And you're - " Sirius started, then realized he really wasn't up to another conversation of this kind with Snape. On top of that, well ... " - you're right. I am. Was there anything else, or are you going to leave me alone now?" He felt tired, yet also a little bit relieved. Having Snape think him a fool, he could live with; it was a lot better than having Snape think of him as a rapist, someone who'd taken advantage of him when he'd been helpless. It hadn't been like that, Sirius knew, but he'd had little doubt Snape would think of it that way, given that the only alternative would be to accept their love-making for what it had been.

"You're coming back to Hogwarts with me," Snape informed him. "You've got ten minutes to pack your bags - don't concern yourself with the bill, as I've already taken care of it."

 

[5]

While all of Hogwarts was celebrating the victory and trying to forget what that victory had cost them, Snape had quietly slipped away at the first chance he'd gotten, unnoticed by all except Sirius - and that only because he'd been expecting it, and kept a close eye on Snape from the first word of Dumbledore's speech (which had been the only one worth listening to, anyway).

Sirius wasn't sure why he was doing this now - he wasn't drunk, or at least, not _that_ drunk. Perhaps it was the way people had been looking at him and Snape alike; Dumbledore had made it clear he considered both Sirius and Snape valuable members of the wizarding world and definitely on the side of Good, but Sirius knew that in spite of that, a lot of people would never quite stop wondering.

The Ministry was none too eager to admit they'd sent an innocent man to Azkaban. Sirius didn't much care about that, in truth; he'd prefer to never have to think about Azkaban ever again, only the way the Ministry was responding to Dumbledore's demand for them to clear Sirius' name made it all too clear that for all that Good had won, the world still hadn't gone perfect overnight.

At least Sirius had a few good friends - Remus, for one, and Tonks, and Harry and, well, pretty much everyone who'd gotten to know him in the line of duty, or so Sirius liked to think. He hadn't gone out of his way to make friends, but he'd made an effort to fit in.

Snape hadn't, of course - and yes, that had been in part because he'd been working as a spy, someone to wriggle himself into Voldemort's confidence, yet even after he'd been found out and had joined the side of Good openly, he'd still kept to himself. Sirius hadn't talked to him since that night Dumbledore had restored Snape's memories, but he'd talked to people who had, and they'd all agreed that Snape had gone straight back to being the same unpleasant individual he'd been before.

Things weren't going to be easy for Snape, Sirius figured. Dumbledore'd probably want him reinstated as a Potions-teacher (not DADA, although God knew Snape had been through enough to earn it, not to mention he was probably better qualified than anyone else right now) and the Ministry, no doubt, would not like that one bit.

Snape hadn't locked his door, Sirius was a bit surprised to discover.

"Kindly make up your mind as to whether or not you want to come in, Black. You're letting in a draft."

Sirius grimaced, entered and closed the door behind him.


End file.
